Halloween Spirit
by Miraichaos
Summary: The agents of Border start feeling the spirit of Halloween in a not-so-good way when strange events begin to happen around them.
1. It doesn't take a Witch's cat

A/N: Anyone who was around this time last year reading Black Trigger might remember me talking about Halloween one-shots or some sort. In the end, I only posted one story, but this year, it's my hope to post a one-shot every Monday in October, then one last one on Halloween itself. These will be based on random legends I find on the internet, so they might be a bit strange, but hey, it's new for me too. Sorry for any errors, OOCness, typos and overall crappy writing. I hope you guys like these, and if you know any good legends or stories you want to see incorporated, leaves a review :)

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Kei Tachikawa had never been a morning person. He hated getting out of bed before 9am, and his preferable wake-up time was after 10. When he had been in school, he had been forced to wake up extremely early in the morning, and was glad to have finally escaped that fate after graduation. However, working for Border did not always guarantee him the late start in the morning that he wanted. There were some days that Tachikawa had to wake up as early as 7am at the latest in order to make it to a meeting on time. Those days were terrible, and Tachikawa was always cranky and tired until he was back in his bed.

When Tachikawa got a message from Kido on his way home from work on an early October night, the contented feeling he had gained from spending two hours chopping up Neighbors for Defense Duty disappeared in an instant.

 _'Meeting at 7:30 tomorrow morning. Don't be late again, or next time I'm sending Jin to make sure you wake up early enough to get here.'_

Tachikawa cursed under his breath, eyes narrowing at the words on his phone as if that would somehow convey his annoyance to his boss. Not only had Kido dropped a 7:20am meeting bomb on him, the man had threatened him with _Jin_ of all people. Jin was a good guy, of course, and Tachikawa knew that. He had singlehandedly avoided hundreds of deaths in the Second Invasion alone, even though the whole ordeal had left him visually drained and stressed. However, Jin could also be extremely annoying, and the last thing Tachikawa wanted to hear first thing in the morning was his rival calling him through his apartment door with that annoying, taunting, sing-songy voice, waking up all the people in the surrounding apartments as he did so. That fate had to be avoided at all costs, even if it meant the sacrifice of Tachikawa's day.

In the end, Tachikawa found himself forced awake the next morning by the annoying buzzer alarm on his phone. His eyes were heavy and they burned when he tried to open them, which left the poor Attacker to helplessly paw at the mattress next to him in search of the offending device. Once he finally found it, he slapped at the screen until the alarm silenced, then burrowed deeper into his blankets.

Tachikawa had only a few seconds of blissful comfort until his eyes suddenly flew open at the returning memory of Kido's message. Jin. Hell no. To risk falling back asleep and missing the meeting would only make things worse later on.

Surrendering to his terrible fate, Tachikawa groaned and rolled over in bed, slowly kicking his blankets off, only to suddenly yank them back on. His apartment was _freezing._ Since when had mornings ever been so cold? The chill in the air encouraged Tachikawa to just go back to sleep, consequences be damned; though with a single thought of hearing "Tachikaaaaaaaaawa-saaaaaan?" from outside his apartment door at 7am, the young man was springing out of bed.

Quicker than he ever had before, Tachikawa pulled his warmest slacks from the wardrobe in the corner, along with a t-shirt and some boxers, and changed out of his pajamas. He then picked up a thick gray sweater from the floor and yanked it on, zipping it up all the way. The Border agent also found a pair of fuzzy socks that he always told people he didn't own, since fuzzy socks were girly, and pulled them over his ice-cold feet.

Finally beginning to warm up, Tachikawa checked the time; it was 7:05. He needed to be out the door in the next five minutes to avoid being late. With that in mind, Tachikawa headed for the kitchen, where he grabbed a bagel from a bag in the cupboard and stuffed it in the toaster. While he waited for his breakfast to heat up, he searched around for a scarf and his shoes, finding the latter by the door and the former in his closet. He wrapped his scarf around his neck, and was in the process of tugging on his shoes when the toaster launched his bagel into the air. After he finished pulling on his shoes, he grabbed his bagel, which had fallen onto the the counter, stuffed it into his mouth, picked up his wallet, Trigger and keys, then headed out.

The air outside was even colder than it had been inside, leaving Tachikawa to shrink into his clothes like a turtle would his shell in an attempt to stay warm. His eyes were still a bit heavy, and his body was still tired, despite the cold air that bit at the exposed hand that held his bagel. He needed something warm and caffeinated, and the coffee shop on his way to Border was just the thing. It wasn't busy, due to the time, and Tachikawa was in an out in just a minute with a warm coffee in hand. He wasn't really a coffee guy, but sometimes the gross drink was needed, and the taste could at least be remedied with lots of creamer and milk.

With a scalding coffee in one hand and a toasted bagel in the other, Tachikawa was finally able to feel his fingers. The caffeine from his drink was also starting to wake him up, at least enough that he'd be able to somewhat pay attention during the meeting he was headed to. On the other hand, he wasn't quite conscious enough to see the cat that darted out in front of him, at least not until he stepped on the small creature's tail, earning an angry, pained scream.

"Oh shit!" Tachikawa hissed, jumping backwards in surprise. He looked down at the snow-white cat in front of him, which was crouched down with it's ears flattened against its head. The cat stared him down, then hissed at him for good measure, before it stalked off into an alley. Tachikawa watched the cat leave as his adrenaline rush fainted, leaving him even more exhausted than before.

With a sigh, Tachikawa sipped his coffee again, then continued his walk to HQ. He didn't make it very far, though, before his foot caught on a large crack in the sidewalk, sending him to the pavement face-first. Reflexes saved his coffee and bagel, but his cheek earned a small scrape, and some of his coffee had spilled into his hair. It wasn't enough to be visibly noticeable, but Tachikawa could already smell the faint aroma of coffee coming from his hair, even in the autumn wind that messed up his untamed mane even further. It caused him to curse as he pushed himself to his feet and continued his walk.

Just a few minutes later, Tachikawa rounded a corner, only to run directly into a jogger.

"Oh! Dude, I'm so sorry!" the jogger said with a surprised and worried tone as he recovered from the impact. The jogger had stayed on his feet, but Tachikawa had hit the ground. In his tired state, he was unable to react quick enough to balance himself. The jogger offered Tachikawa a hand, which Tachikawa stared at for a second before accepting with the free hand that had previously held his bagel before his fall. The jogger apologized again, then once more when they saw the scrape Tachikawa had gotten in his earlier fall, thinking he had just received it.

"I got that earlier. I'm fine," Tachikawa assured as he sent the person on their way. It was nice to see that some people still had manners, so Tachikawa put on a nice front for the jogger, even though he was not at all okay. He waited until the jogger was far down the street before he allowed himself to sigh deeply and looked longingly down at the half-eaten bagel that had been knocked out of his hand in the collision. His stomach rumbled sadly at its loss of food, but there was no time to stop for anything to nibble on. With yet another sigh, Tachikawa kept walking.

-000-

When the entrance to HQ came into view, Tachikawa felt relieved. HQ was at least a comfortable temperature, and even though that wouldn't solve the problem of his facial damage, coffee hair, and lost bagel, it was still a small victory. However, Tachikawa's misfortune was not over yet, because somehow, a manhole cover in the middle of the path to the door hand not been replaced correctly, and was sticking up. Tachikawa had his face in his scarf to warm his numb cheeks, so he missed this detail, and was sent face-first into the pavement for the third time that morning when his foot caught on the heavy lid, gaining another scrape on his forehead. He also lost his coffee, which slipped out of his hand and splashed onto the pavement. With a groan, Tachikawa pushed himself to his feet once again, and forced his legs to move again as he headed for the main entrance to HQ in the Forbidden Zone. He didn't feel like getting stuck in an elevator that day by chancing any entrance other than the direct one. The young man was so tired that he couldn't even bring himself to care about his lost coffee. With the choice he had made, he was sure he'd be okay for the rest of his trip. What else could possibly go wrong?

As it turned out, _many_ things could still go wrong, and one of them was Neighbors. The Gate pretty much spawned on top of Tachikawa, causing him to growl in frustration. He was absolutely _done_ with the day already, and he hadn't even been awake for half an hour yet. Even the usually-exciting thought of fighting a Neighbor filled him with nothing but annoyance. The agent spun around to face the Gate and activated his Trigger. When a Bamster walked out of the inky black portal, Tachikawa was already attacking.

"DAMMIT ALREADY!" he yelled as he sliced easily through the Trion Soldier. He let gravity pull him back to the ground, and he had already deactivated his Trigger and was walking toward HQ with his hands shoved into his pockets by the time all of the Bamster's pieces had hit the ground.

Tachikawa ignored the stares as he stalked through HQ, and he sent Kido a glare as he walked into the nearly-full meeting room with a minute to spare looking worse than Miwa on a bad day. The young man dropped down into a chair next to Jin with what was probably his tenth sigh of the day, as his exhaustion caught up to him once and for all, while his stomach rumbled to protest its discontentment. Tachikawa let his eyes slip shut for just a second of rest, then opened them back up when he heard the crinkle of a bag in front of his face. He looked to his right to see Jin holding out an unopened pouch of rice crackers.

"You look like you've had a rough morning," the brunette stated simply as his rival grabbed the food from his hand. Tachikawa ripped open the bag and shoved a cracker in his mouth as he spoke.

"All started with that stupid cat," he mumbled. Jin winced.

"You didn't see a white cat, did you? It's October. Bad luck, Tachikawa-san," Jin pointed out, before he turned to fix his wise blue eyes on Kido as the meeting began. Tachikawa only sighed quietly and ate another cracker. Bad luck of not, he had a new hatred for cats, as well as a bone to pick with Jin, who had probably foreseen what would happen with his stupid Side Effect. Damn, foresight would have been useful to have when he'd woken up that morning.

By the time the meeting reached it's end, Tachikawa's mind had too. He rose from his chair with everyone else, then booked it to his squad's room, where he promptly passed out on the couch, muttering about how he should have just stayed home. He just hoped his bad luck would end in time for him to go home, because if he kissed the pavement one more time, it wouldn't be Neighbors that Border would have to deal with. It would be him destroying Mikado City.


	2. When a Banshee Screams

A/N: I'm going to be totally honest with you guys, I completely forgot about these one shots. I wrote the first draft of this chapter last Thursday, then forgot about it until about an hour ago. It's a bit more rushed than I'd like, but I want to post it today, and I'm honestly not sure if I'll have any time tomorrow to improve it. Besides, some of these ideas are even a bit strange already. I got chapter 1's white cat prompt from a Halloween website, and I'm pretty sure it's supposed to be a black cat, but I spent five years hiding my black cat every year on Halloween, and I don't feel like encouraging the superstitious people out to kill them. Anyway, sorry for any errors, OOCness, typos or just overall crappy writing. I hope you guys like this chapter, and I'll be back next Wednesday with part three :)

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For the lack of a better word, Reiji Kizaki was a nonbeliever. He didn't believe in any kind of higher power guiding life, and he didn't believe that there was an afterlife. People made their own decisions, and they controlled themselves. When they died, it was the end, no heaven nor hell awaited them. No angel would appear at a human's prayer, and no god brought the seasons that shed cherry blossums and rained snow. It was all science and the spin of the earth.

Along with his lack of belief in a higher power, Reiji also spared no thought to the supernatural. He didn't jump at shadows, and he didn't spend his nights with his blankets pulled up to his chin to keep the vampires away after a horror movie. He didn't think that the dolls held in the arms of little children during a walk around town would come to life at night as evil beings bent on luring curious kids to their deaths. The streaks Reiji saw out of the corner of his eye were just someone moving, not a ghost looking to tear out his soul. For Reiji Kizaki, supernatural beings were all myths, and a waste of time. They were something to sigh at and forget. He was not afraid of things that did not exist.

It was Reiji's strength and his lack of fear in just about everything that made him the perfect candidate for Defense Duty shifts after 11pm. Neighbors could strike at any time, regardless of whether it was daylight or night, so someone always had to be watching. Due to that, at 11pm, Reiji was headed out the door into the dark October night on his way to Defense Duty.

The air outside was cold, very cold, much more so than during the day. Reiji was wearing a sweatshirt over his long-sleeved shirt, but it did little to ward off the freeze that crawled through his veins. As he walked, his breaths turned to tendrils of faded white fog in front of him. He ended up picking up his pace a bit as he headed toward Border HQ and the Forbidden Zone, just to warm up a little.

Just a few minutes into his walk, though, Reiji saw someone turn the corner to his right. He saw just the flash of a silhouette exiting an alley and turning onto the road that Reiji himself was walking on, but the person was headed the other way. Curiosity born from his lack of anything to do, as well as suspicion over who would be out so late at night, won over Reiji's mind, and he turned to look at the person who he'd just seen. However, there was no one there.

Puzzled, Reiji stopped, eyeing the stores near the alley. They were all closed, and there was no way the person had gone the twenty yards between the alley they had emerged from to the next one on the street in the mere two seconds it had taken Reiji to look behind him. The whole incident was unrealistic in nature, and with a small shake of his head, Reiji chalked up the whole thing to hallucinations due to lack of sleep, and he continued his walk.

-000-

Time seemed to be moving oddly slow as Reiji passed the halfway point between Border HQ and Tamakoma, which happened to be a coffee shop that Rindo frequented on days that he had meetings with the other executives. Reiji himself had never been there, and he was just wondering if they had anything good on their menu when he saw a flash of movement out of the corner of his eye again.

This time, Reiji turned to look behind him quickly, and thought he saw the train of a white dress flowing in the wind, just before his eyes were met with an empty street. He furrowed his brow is suspicion. His walk was only getting weirder and weirder. If he kept seeing things, he would need to take a longer nap before his nighttime Defense Duty next time he was assigned to it.

Reiji had only turned back to face forward and taken one step when he suddenly heard an ear-splitting screech. It echoed through his brain, causing a wave of pain. As he tried to clear the fog that the paralyzing sound was forming in his mind, Reiji noticed that the scream sounded like it was coming from the alley next to him, and it held the same tone throughout. Then, suddenly, it stopped.

Reiji rubbed his head as his face relaxed and his eyes opened fully. The pain in his skull faded away, allowing him to focus more on his surroundings and staying on his feet. He looked around for the scream's source, but saw nothing. He then backed up a few steps and looked down the alley he had just passed, which was where he was sure the scream had come from. The alley was dimly lit by the nearby streetlight, but not much illumination was needed to see that the space was completely empty. Reiji frowned. The noise had definitely come from that allley, he was sure of it, unless he had just imagined the whole thing, but that seemed just a bit more farfetched than the thought that someone really had been there.

More confused than anything else, Reiji continued walking toward HQ, only to stop as a memory struck him out of the blue. It was October, the month of Halloween, which had caught the attention of Yuma. The Neighbor boy had gotten curious about the holiday, and Osamu and Chika had spent the whole day showing him myths and legends and explaining how the whole thing worked. One of those things that Yuma had been shown was the legend of the Banshee. The Banshee was a death omen from early times in the European area, which would appear before someone and scream if the person was soon going to die. After hearing it's screech from the videos Yuma had watched, Reiji had silently dubbed the Banshee Konami's long-lost twin.

The thought had been amusing earlier, but after hearing a similar screech when it was almost midnight as he walking down the street to go spend five hours defending the city from creatures from another dimension, thinking about Konami's Banshee-like qualities was no longer fun at all. It wasn't that Reiji was convinced he would die or anything. He didn't jump to conclusions like his gullible teammate, let alone believe in Halloween lore, but the situation was still a bit peculiar.

The stone cold logic part of Reiji's mind that wasn't at all affected by all that had happened, decided that maybe some woman had been attacked nearby. Even though he risked being late to Defense Duty by going off course, Reiji activated his Trigger, then jumped up onto the rooftops to investigate.

However, after five minutes of combing the surrounding area, Reiji turned up nothing. Either he had imagined everything, or whoever had screamed was far away. Regardless, there was nothing he could do to fix the problem. In the end, Reiji found himself actually hoping he was hallucinating, because the thought of failing to protect people, just as he had failed to protect his student in the Second Invasion, was a heavy burden of guilt that he didn't want to feel again.

With a silent sigh, Reiji returned to the street, where he deactivated his Trigger and continued walking.

-000-

When Reiji reached the Forbidden Zone, he tracked down an exhausted Arashiyama and tired Tokieda. The latter had simply had an early morning, while the former hadn't slept in almost 48 hours, and was running on fumes. Arashiyama stilled smiled though, when he saw Reiji, and drew on his last reserves of energy to smoothly switch out with the man.

"There's been no activity in the past few hours, Reiji-san, so it might be pretty slow tonight," Arashiyama informed after Reiji activated his Trigger. The man nodded, and was about to send the two teens in front of him on their way when he remembered what he'd heard earlier.

"Arashiyama, did you happen to hear a really loud screech about twenty minutes ago?" Reiji asked. It had been loud, and Reiji didn't doubt that it could have been heard so far away when the city was as quiet as it had been.

Arashiyama fixed Reiji with a confused look, cocking his head to the side like a dog.

"No?" he said, though it was more like a question. Reiji nodded.

"I guess I was just imagining things.." he muttered to himself, gaining another confused look from the younger captain in front of him.

"What?" Arashiyama asked, not understanding what the man in front of him had just said. Reiji shook his head dismissively.

"I'm just a little tired. You should get home, though. You look like you're going to pass out on your feet," the man advised, steering the conversation in a different direction. Arashiyama nodded, flashing Reiji a smile.

"I will. Stay safe, Reiji-san," Arashiyama said, before he turned away and headed toward HQ with Tokieda. Reiji watched the two go for a moment, then he turned and started to walk, only to stop after his fourth step.

 _"He who hears a Banshee screech is doomed to die, and only he will hear it..."_ Reiji recalled the phrase from Yuma's videos. Arashiyama hadn't heard anything.

A gust of cold wind hit Reiji straight in the face, and the man shook his head. He would definitely take a longer nap before Defense Duty next time. Imagining things would just make it harder to focus on work

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A/N: Is it even possible to scare Reiji...


	3. Death's Door

A/N: Hello there! For the third part of this one-shot series I found a creepy story, because no good legends are showing up on the internet for me. It's a bit disappointing, and I'm kind of scraping around for ideas right now. Unfortunately, this series isn't my best work, but it's supposed to be kind of crackish, so I'm trying not to think much of it. Anyway, sorry for any errors, typos, OOCness and just overall crappy writing. I hope you all enjoy this story, and I'll be back next week with part four.

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"Kirie, I went shopping today, so there's plenty of food in the refrigerator. I also gave the spare key to the neighbors, so if you lose your key, you can still get in the house. Your father and I will be back this Saturday, and we'll keep our phones on us when we can, so just call if you have a problem," Konami's mother said as she rushed around the house, grabbing the things she'd forgotten that she needed for her business trip to another prefecture.

"Alright, but if I need to, I could always go stay at Tamakoma," Konami reminded, peeking into the refrigerator in hopes of finding a package of red bean pancakes. There were none. How disappointing.

"You know we'd rather you stay here. Working for Border is dangerous enough on its own. The last thing we want is for you to get hurt by Neighbors while we're away," Konami's mom said, clucking her tongue disapprovingly. She'd never liked the idea of Konami being in Border, especially as a combatant.

"I'll be fine," Konami assured. Her mother stopped for a moment to fix her with a stubborn look, but quickly sighed and relented, returning to her task of gathering her bags.

"Just be good," the woman said, pulling open the door and carrying her bags through. She set one down and turned back to pull the door closed when she suddenly locked her eyes on her daughter again. "No parties, and no boys," she reminded, before pulling the door shut.

Konami sighed, turning back to the refrigerator as she listened to her father's car pull out of the driveway. The sound of the engine faded as Konami's parents got further away, leaving the girl alone.

Already beginning to feel bored, Konami headed upstairs with a bottled water in hand, planning to get a start on the homework she had been putting off all weekend. As she sat down at her desk and laid out all the papers, her eyes flicked from the dizzying sets of numbers to her Trigger, which rested within arm's reach on the white wood of her desk. Reluctantly, she looked back at her homework. A Neighbor Invasion would be much easier to fight than Calculus.

-000-

Two days later, Konami was at Tamakoma, struggling in a ten round match against Yuma. The boy got better every day, and the more they fought, the easier he saw through her moves. She had gotten a grasp on how he fought as well, but the younger teen was unbelievably adaptive, so she couldn't always beat him. Also, that day in particular, the two had made a deal. Yuma had left his phone at HQ the previous night, and it had been picked up by Midorikawa. The young agent was planning to return it the next time he and Yuma did a Rank War, but meanwhile, Yuma was left without a way to read Halloween lore on the internet. He had taken a liking to the stories, some of them being very similar to lore and legends he'd heard in Neighborhood, and had been reading them almost non-stop in his freetime. Before starting his match with Konami, they two had agreed that Konami would lend Yuma her phone to read his stories if he got five wins.

In the end, Yuma won five times, and he walked happily out of the simulation room with his mentor's phone in hand as she yelled after him to make sure he didn't drop it. Unfortunately, not only had Konami been beaten by her student five times out of ten, but she had lost her only form of entertainment. That left her with nothing to do but sulk around and watch crappy reruns on the television until Yuma left to go fight Midorikawa at HQ.

When Konami got her phone back, she went to delete any tabs Yuma had left open on the internet, but before she could do so, the title of a darkly colored page caught her attention. It said, 'Knock. Knock. Knock.' which wasn't very impressive for the title of a Halloween story. However, as Konami's eyes wandered and she began reading through the story, she started to see why it was thought of as creepy.

In summary, the story was about two young children, who were left home alone one night when their parents had to go out for work. The mom told the children not to answer the door if someone knocked, no matter what, then left with her husband. The two children obeyed for awhile, spending what remained of the day watching cartoons before going to bed when it got dark. However, during the night, the two were awoken by the sound of someone knocking on the door. They both ignored it for awhile, just like their mother had told them to, but the knocking only continued, and the little sister got curious. The child got out of bed and headed to the door, which she opened, despite what her mother had said. Upstairs, the older brother waited to hear his sister come back, but she never did.

After a while, the boy started to wonder where his sister had gone, and he went downstairs and pulled on his shoes and coat, before heading to the neighbor's house. When he got there, the young couple was glad to see that he was okay, because apparently, the police had just shown up after someone called in a murder down the street. The victim turned out to be the boy's sister, who had never returned to her room. She had been stabbed to death, and after the police checked the children's house for any dangers, they found a bloodied knife in the brother's bed, though the little boy didn't know how it had gotten there.

"Ew," Konami mumbled when she finished the story. Without another thought, she closed the tab and checked her text messages before slipping her phone back into her pocket. It was starting to get late, and she needed to get home. The strawberry blonde teen said goodbye to Rindo, Reiji, Shiori and Kyosuke, who were the only ones at Tamakoma at the time, then headed home, not knowing what she had gotten herself into.

-000-

That night, Konami tiredly slapped the light switch on her wall before flopping onto her bed. She pulled the warm blankets up to her shoulders and burrowed into them in an attempt to escape the chill that had settled in her room over the past few hours. Slowly but surely, she began to warm up, until she was drifting off to sleep in a cocoon of warmth. However, before she could fully fall asleep, a quiet noise was picked up by her ears.

Knock. Knock. Knock.

At first, the teen thought the was imagining things, so she shuffled around a little and tried to grab onto the tendrils of sleep, which had slipped away from her.

Knock. Knock. Knock.

She hadn't imagined that one. Annoyed, Konami moved to pull of her blankets, wondering who the hell would be at her door at eleven at night before she suddenly froze.

 _'The mother told her children not to answer the door if someone knocked, no matter what.'_

No, that was just some stupid story someone made up to scare people. There wasn't actually some maniac going around knocking on people's doors just to scare them.

Knock. Knock. Knock.

Konami laid back down, drawing her covers up to her eyes. She took a deep breath and tried to think rationally. It was probably just some delivery guy who got the wrong address, not some crazy killer. Besides, even if there was a dangerous person outside her house, she was fine as long as she didn't open the door.

Knock. Knock. Knock.

Rolling over, Konami tried to block out the knocking, but it was impossible. The sound seemed to only get louder to the point that it was all she could hear. It became annoying, and it made it impossible to sleep. The knocking just kept going and going and going, until Konami growled and ripped her blankets off. She rolled out of bed and snatched her Trigger from her desk, before running out of the room. She crept silently down the stairs to the first floor, and approached the door slowly.

Knock. Knock. Knock.

Konami activated her Trigger quietly, wincing at the slight noise it made. Once she was in her Trion body, the teen crept closer to the door and grabbed the handle with her left hand. In her other hand, she held her battle axe, ready to swing it at any psychopath waiting outside. With a deep breath to steel herself, Konami ripped the door open...and saw nothing.

No one stood outside. It was just darkness and distant trees, no people in sight. It made Konami wonder if she had actually hallucinated the whole thing, and her body began to relax. She lowered the arm that held her axe as her gaze dropped to the ground, where she saw something that glinted in the pale moonlight.

A knife. Stained with blood.

Konami jumped back and screamed, quick and loud. Anyone who heard it would think that it was a quick squeak from the sticky breaks of a car that needed to be oiled. That is, if anyone had heard it. None of that mattered to Konami, though, who was busy slamming her door shut and locking it, before booking it up the stairs. She ran down the hallway to her room, then dove inside, slamming the door shut and falling against it. She sucked in deep breaths, eyes wide in shock over what she'd just seen. She hadn't seen anyone, but there was obviously someone there, because how else had the bloody knife gotten on her doorstep.

In her panic, Konami became extremely aware of the fact that she was home alone, and even though she was one of the strongest agents in Border, serial killers weren't exactly in her range of expertise. She needed to call someone who could solve the problem, or at least someone who she trusted to watch her back as she ran for her life away from her house.

Konami jumped up from the floor and ran across her room to grab her phone off of her bed. She immediately went to dial the police's number when she realized that the police would take at least twenty minutes to reach her house, even if they rushed. After the First Invasion, the police headquarters was moved, since the original was in the Forbidden Zone. They were now on the opposite side of town, and Konami didn't feel like waiting for them. On the other hand, who else was she supposed to call? Jin was one idea, as he excelled at hand to hand combat even in his normal body, but Tamakoma was a fifteen minute walk away, so it'd take him awhile to get to her. That also ruled out Reiji. Yuma was another option, but Konami didn't know where he lived, which could very likely be the other side of town. If she couldn't call any of them, the who else was there?

Konami scrolled through her list of contacts, and suddenly stopped over a very familiar name. Kyosuke. He lived a ten minute walk away, so he'd be able to get to her house quickly. Without any further hesitation, Konami clicked on his number and put her phone to her ear, praying that he'd answer. The phone rang once...twice...three times...

"Konami-senpai? It's almost midnig-" he began, only to be cut off by his senior.

"Torimaru! There's some serial killer outside my house and my parents aren't here and Idon'tknowhowtodealwithcrazypeople," she said hurriedly.

"Wait, slows down. What happened?" Kyosuke asked, sounding more alert than he had when he'd first answered.

"I kept hearing someone knocking on the door, and I ignored it, but it just kept going. Eventually I answered it, but there was no one there. I thought I was fine, but then I looked down and saw a knife on my doorstep, and there was blood..." Konami trailed off, her voice shaky. She could hear rustling on the other end, like Kyosuke was moving around.

"Why didn't you call the police? If something happened, you need to tell them," he said.

"I know! I was going to, but they're really far away, and I don't want to wait here for them while some psycho killer tries to get into my house!" she told him. Kyosuke sighed.

"Just stay put. I'm headed over. You still live where you did before the Second Invasion, right?" he asked.

"Yeah."

"I'll be there soon. Call me if the person comes back." The phone cut off, and Konami tightened her grip on her battle axe. If only it was a Neighbor. Then, she wouldn't be so afraid.

-000-

Seven minutes later, someone knocked on the door, and Konami stiffened.

"Konami-senpai, it's me."

Konami ran out of her room and took the stairs two at a time, booking it to the door, which she ripped open to reveal a confused Kyosuke.

"Konami-senpai, there's no knife here, or blood," he said, pointing toward the ground. Konami's eyes widened, and she looked down to see that he was right. There was no knife in sight, and not a drop of blood stained the concrete.

"It was there ten minutes ago..." she mumbled, stepping back. Had the killer come back to retrieve their weapon?

"Konami-senpai, when Yuma borrowed your phone earlier, was he reading scary stories?" Kyosuke asked. Konami nodded. "Did you read any of those stories?" She nodded again. "Did any of them involve bloody knives and knocking on doors?" Slowly, Konami nodded once more, and Kyosuke sighed.

"Wa- I didn't just imagine it all!" Konami argued. "I know someone was knocking on the door, and I saw the knife myself!" she told him, but Kyosuke shook his head.

"It's late, were both tired. You probably were dreaming, and thought you heard knocking and saw a knife," Kyosuke guessed, and he didn't doubt that at all. Konami had always been so gullible.

"I didn't! And even if I did, how am I supposed to sleep knowing that there's a possibility of a psycho lurking around my house? How am I supposed to brush that off?!" she asked. Kyosuke shrugged.

"If you don't want to stay here, you could always go to Tamakoma," he suggested. When Konami had called him earlier, he'd been filled with fear. She had sounded genuinely afraid, enough so that Kyosuke had thoughtless run somewhere that supposedly had a serial killer lurking around. Sure, he was in his Trion body, but regardless, it's wasn't exactly safe to run around at midnight chasing psychos. Seeing Konami with her usual stubborn spark back had eased the tension in his muscles, because he knew that she was okay.

Kyosuke didn't notice that Konami had gone silent until he looked up and saw a red dust on her cheeks in the dim light of the front door. He sighed.

"Do you seriously still think that there's a serial killer lurking around?" he asked. She didn't respond, and he sighed. "Get what you need, and I'll walk to Tamakoma with you. I need to grab some homework I left there, anyway," he offered.

Konami nodded, but didn't speak or eye contact. She was embarrassed by how much of a chicken she was, despite the power that she knew she had. She wanted to tell Kyosuke to just go home, because she was perfectly capable of walking on her own, but in all reality, the last thing she wanted was to be walking down the dark streets by herself.

Konami quickly gathered a small bag of things, which included her school uniform, some make up, and her homework. She then walked passed Kyosuke in the doorway, pulled the door shut, and locked it. After that, she realized that she was still in her Trion body, so she deactivated her Trigger and shoved it into the pocket of her pajama pants.

The two walked away from the house in silence, which was soon broken by Kyosuke at the end of the driveway.

"Did you know that your phone will break if you call someone after 11pm?" Konami whipped out her phone. "That was a lie." Kyosuke was quick to end the joke this time.

"You tricked me!"

-000-

When Kyosuke and Konami arrived at Tamakoma, Konami thanked Kyosuke for his help and headed up to her room. Kyosuke considered going upstairs as well and sleeping rather than going back home, since he was already at Tamakoma. He'd been lying when he said he'd left homework there. It had been an excuse to solve his earlier problem as quickly as possible.

After a few seconds of debating, Kyosuke decided to just sleep at Tamakoma, and he pulled out his phone to let his parents know that he was there. In doing so, he wasn't watching where he was going, and he ran into the couch. Tiredness had caught up with him, so he couldn't stop himself from falling. He ended up in an surprisingly comfortable position on his side on the squishy cushions of the couch, which were quick to make him sleepy. However, just before he fell asleep, Kyosuke heard a soft noise from the door.

Knock. Knock. Knock.

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A/N: I thought making Konami's 'weakness' dangerous humans was interesting because she's a very powerful warrior when she fights Neighbors, so I think it would be ironic for her to fear the people she protects more than she fears her enemies. Anyone agree?


	4. Rainy Days of Vanishing Hitchhikers

A/N: Hey guys. This chapter is so crap in my opinion, but honestly, it was a lot harder than I thought to find Halloween legends and myths other than the generic vampires, werewolves, witches, and doppelgangers stuff. It didn't help that I ran out of time, but that's all on me. Anyway, sorry for any typos, errors, OOCness and just overall crappy writing. I'll be back next Monday on Halloween to sum this all up and hopefully answer the questions these one-shots have undoubtedly caused. I hope you enjoy the chapter

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Rained poured from the dark sky, slapping the windshield of Rindo's car loudly as he drove down a deserted back road. He was on his way back to Mikado, having just finished some business in the next town over. It was just some simple Border stuff, and had mostly been paperwork. The whole thing had taken Rindo the entire day, but there were few problems, so everything worked out well in the end.

Quietly, Rindo cursed under his breath as he hunched over in an attempt to see through the windshield easier. He had already slowed down due to the poor visibility, but that only seemed to make it harder to see. Rindo was left cautiously peering out into the woods around him in search of any animals that dared run out in front of his car.

After awhile, the rain started to let up a bit, just enough that Rindo could actually see where he was going. The man sighed and sat up in his seat, rolling his shoulders to relieve the tension that had built up when he was hunched over. The action almost caused him to miss the figure walking on the side of the road, one arm stuck out with a thumb pointed toward the clouds.

Rindo wasn't the type of man to stop for hitchhikers, mostly because he didn't trust them at all. Some hitchhikers were just murderers looking for an easy in, and he didn't feel like dying any time soon. However, the one on the road was different, at least different enough that Rindo found himself with his foot to the floor on the brake pedal. The tires of his car screeched at the sudden halt, and he skidded forward a few meters before finally coming a stop.

The person on the side of the road had raised their arms, shielding their eyes from the spray of water from Rindo's car. After he stopped, though, they lowered them, allowing Rindo to see their face. It was a young woman who looked to be no older than Yuri. She also looked quite a bit like Rindo's niece, too, enough so that he put his car in park. The girl cautiously approached his vehicle, raising up on her toes to try to see through the rainy window. Rindo waved for her to get in from his seat, and the girl seemed to get the message, because she opened the passenger door and jumped inside.

"You okay? It's a little cold to be walking through the middle of nowhere in the rain," Rindo commented as the girl pulled the door shut. She shook her head and offered up a smile as she adjusted her light sweater.

"I'm fine. Thank you for picking me up," she said with a small bow. Rindo only returned her smile.

"It's not a problem. Now, where are you headed?" he asked, putting the car back into drive.

"Mikado City," she said after a moment of thought. Rindo nodded.

"Good, good. I'm headed there too. Just let me know where to go when we get there," he said, then he stepped on the gas and continued down the road. A comfortable silence settled between the two for just two minutes before the girl spoke.

"Did you know that someone was killed in a hit and run on this road before?" the girl asked, a dark undertone in her voice. A chill crept up Rindo's spine as he shook his head.

"No. Was it recent?" he asked. The girl shook her head.

"It happened quite a few years ago. A young woman was walking down this very road in the dead of night, suffering through the cold rain. She was trying to hitchhike, but no one ever came by. She walked for hours, then suddenly, the road behind her began to light up," the girl began. Rindo listened intently, slightly creeped out by both the girl and the story. "She turned around to look at the car, only for it to run right into her. Since she was facing the road, the force of the car threw her off the side of the road into the woods, where she died, rather than into the road itself. Her body was never found, but her blood was. Someone saw some on the car that hit her. It was underneath the car, where the rain couldn't wash it away, barely noticeable."

"That's horrible," Rindo said, his mind wandering to his old comrades. He wondered if any of them had died in a similar way. Thinking someone was coming to help them, only to come face to face with an enemy who killed them without mercy...

"Afterwards," the girl began, stealing back Rindo's attention. "People began to see weird things while driving down this road. They believe they saw the woman, her eyes wide as they draw near. They don't feel an impact if they drive into her, so they know there's no real person. Legend says that the woman now haunts this road as a hitchhiker who no one sees unless it's dark and rainy. She's still trying to get home, because she doesn't know that she's dead."

Rindo stayed silent for a moment, mulling the story over. As he thought it through, he felt an involuntary shiver run through his entire body.

"What about the person that hit her? How did they not notice?" he asked.

"It was so rainy that he couldn't see her. When he hit her, she didn't fly out in front of him or go up and over the car, so he just thought he'd hit a pothole and lost control of his car in the rain for a moment," she explained. Rindo didn't respond. "Well, it is just a legend, but it's really creepy! I was a bit worried that I might see the ghost when I was walking, so I'm glad you picked me up," the girl said, suddenly very cheery and bright. It did little to put Rindo at ease, but he still managed to force a smile.

"Well I'm glad you're not hurt," he told her. Despite his untruthful expression, Rindo was serious. If he had seen the girl in his car as someone reported dead on the news instead, he would have thought only about how similar she looked to Yuri. That would only lead to more unpleasant thoughts. Plus, he hated seeing innocent people die.

"Oh! Take a right up here!" the girl suddenly said. Rindo spotted the road he needed to turn on and slowed down enough to take the turn. He drove down the street for a little bit, then slowed to a stop when the girl said that they had reached her home.

Rindo watched as the girl got out of the car, and he gave her a small smile when she waved and shut the door. He expected her to walk to the new subdivision on the right side of the road, but instead she crossed in front of him and walked toward a broken down, abandoned old house on the left. Rindo watched, confused, as the girl stepped off of the road toward the house, then abruptly disappeared.

Thinking he had missed something, Rindo blinked, but the girl did not reappear, and the house didn't magically rebuild itself. She had vanished.

Completely mind-boggled and slightly creeped out, Rindo slowly turned around, then headed back to Tamakoma. Upon his arrival, he dropped down at his desk in his office and turned on his computer. Online, he found a story about a young woman who had disappeared just outside of Mikado, only for her blood to be found on a car. Her body was never found, and no picture had been released. Under that search result, Rindo saw a link to legends in Mikado. He clicked on it and scrolled through the list, tensing when his eyes landed on a strange one. It was titled 'Vanishing Hitchhikers' and the description perfectly fit what had happened with the girl he'd driven home.

Rindo pulled off his glasses and scrubbed a hand over his tired face. He was never picking up a hitchhiker again.


	5. The Warrior from the Halloween Planet

A/N: This is complete crap and a day late I'm so sorry. This entire series kind of ended up being a big flop. I didn't think it through much, and I really struggled to find time. Of course yesterday I had to lose internet for the night, so I couldn't post. Sorry for any OOCness, errors, typos and overall crappy writing. I hope you guys at least found this a bit funny, and I'm sorry if this last bit doesn't make a ton of sense. I tried xD

* * *

A young woman sat silently on a small pile of rubble in the Forbidden Zone. There was a the ghost of a smile on her face, just a slight upturn of her lips, that conveyed her amusement. Miden was as fun as she had thought it would be. The stories of her predecessors were every bit as accurate as she has believed.

The girl, a Neighbor from a far away nation, had been selected as the single warrior to go to Miden to carry on the long-running tradition of her country, which had begun years ago with a small handful of people. A group from their nation had ventured into space in search of a place to spread their influence and culture. The group had landed in Miden, and let loose the stories and traditions of their culture that would become the staple of the Miden holiday Halloween.

The original plan had been to colonize on the new planet, but the Neighbors quickly realized that the people of Miden lacked large Trion organs, and would be useless to conquer in the long run.

In the end, the nation decided to simply keep their cultural hold strong on Miden once they noticed how deeply their stories had taken root. They decided that they would send a trained warrior to Miden every year in the month of October to stir up trouble and keep the Halloween spirit strong. That way, if Miden's people ever started being born with better Trion, they Neighbors would have a leg up in conquering them.

Over time, the Neighbors had grown their pool of representatives by starting an academy that anyone could enter. In that academy, they trained their warriors, then the most promising amongst them was selected to go to Miden.

The young woman who sat in the Forbidden Zone was the selected warrior of the year, and she had just reached the end of her one month adventure. She was sad to see the end of it, but she'd had so much fun. The Miden people were extremely fun to trick and scare, living up to her high expectations.

Among those she'd followed and taunted, turning them around or stalking them from the shadows, her favorite had been the man with the little beard. She didn't know his name, but remembered his face well. He'd looked so sad and hopeless once she'd finished with him.

The white cat that got the ball rolling had been a bit difficult handle, but once the Neighbor girl had set it free directly in the path of her target, things started going a lot smoother. She ran ahead of the beard man and used the enhanced strength of her Trion body to break up part of the sidewalk, making it just big enough for his foot to get stuck. After that she'd watched with a smile as the man's toe caught perfectly in the crack and he smacked face-first into the ground, then she moved on to set another trap.

The jogger had been pure coincidence, but it was a golden chance. The Neighbor girl saw that the jogger wasn't on a path to even go near the beard man, so she quickly made her way around until she was across the street from the jogger at a crosswalk, pretending to text while standing in the middle of the path. It was enough to make the jogger rethink his route to avoid what he saw as an ignorant young person engrossed in their phone, and he turned just the way the girl had been hoping. After that, it was all luck. The perfect timing of the collision between the jogger and beard man had sent the later flying into the cold concrete for the second time that day. The loss of the bearded man's bagel was an added bonus.

The manhole cover had been easy, and she hadn't expected him to fall for it, but the guy turned out to be a huge idiot because he kissed the pavement for the third time in ten minutes. The Gate she spawned in the Forbidden Zone as one last trap had been a bit hard to create discreetly, but there was program in her Trigger that took care of the spawning itself for her. She had hoped the man would be spooked by the sudden appearance of an enemy, and was a bit surprised when he simply roared in anger and destroyed the Trion Soldier with ease. That part was a disappointment, but all in all it had been a great day.

Besides the beard man, some other targets, like the strawberry haired girl, were also quite fun. Strawberry girl hadn't been the original target, but the albino boy hadn't been scared at all by the story of the child killer, so the Neighbor girl needed to improvise. She hadn't seen much of the strawberry girl during the prank, but her screech when she'd seen the ketchup covered knife had been the highlight of the Neighbor's week. It was worth spending twenty minutes slowly knocking on the Miden girl's door, then following her and her friend to the house on the river to knock one the door one last time for good measure.

On the other hand, the big muscle guy had been no fun. The Neighbor girl had run through the corner of his vision not once, but twice, and even did the banshee scream she had practiced at the academy for months to perfect. The man had looked around the area after the scream, but there was no fear in his blank expression nor tension in his shoulders. He hadn't been scared at all. Disappointing.

The glasses man with the car hadn't been a ton of fun either. He was very kind and had listened to her story intently as he drove her, careful about interrupting her to ask questions. He had seemed a little creeped out by her story, but didn't let it show. Then, when she'd stepped out of her car and activated the invisibility in her Trigger to disappear, he hadn't shown much more than a little surprise. The Neighbor girl had been hoping for a little more from him than slight terror, and while he had looked a little confused and unnerved when she disappeared, he lacked the fearful expression she had been hoping for.

Other than those four, there had been a few other people who the girl had messed with, but their reactions were a bit generic, and didn't spark any joy in her. It had all just been activities to kill time until she found an interesting target, like beard man or strawberry girl.

"Unknown Trigger reaction…..over here…..likely Neighbors."

Foreign voices pulled the young woman from her thoughts, and her head snapped up. She glanced around and saw no one, but her keen ears could still hear the voices.

"Oh. They found me," the Neighbor mumbled, slightly disappointed. She wanted to stay on Miden a little longer, but it was also the primary job of her nation's representative to not get caught. With a defeated sigh, she got to her feet and held out her hand. A broomstick, which looked just like that of a stereotypical witch, appeared in her hand and she smiled. It was the typical transportation for the representatives just to keep up the image in the case that someone saw them while they were in uniform.

As the voices drew closer, the Neighbor girl leaned on her broom and created a Gate, frowning as sirens began to screech. At that point, it was only a matter of minutes until the Miden warriors found her, meaning she couldn't put it off any longer. She had to leave. With one last look at the Mikado City skyline, the girl sat down on her broom with a soft chuckle and flew through the Gate, which snapped shut behind her. The Border agents who arrived at the scene minutes later were met with nothing, but had it been Kazama squad, Kikuchihara likely could have heard the echo of the quiet laughter that the Neighbor girl left behind.

" _I wish I could come back next year."_


End file.
